


Drowning

by RamblingAtThreeAM



Category: Original Work
Genre: Depression, Gen, Poetry, Trigger Warning: depression
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-06-29
Updated: 2018-06-29
Packaged: 2019-05-30 03:33:59
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 452
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15088106
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/RamblingAtThreeAM/pseuds/RamblingAtThreeAM
Summary: A piece of poetry I had to write for a school assignment that I felt was good enough to post.





	Drowning

Imagine you're drowning. You're drowning in a pitch black ocean of worries, doubts and fears. There are cold, rusty metal chains clamped obstinately around your flailing ankles, dragging you down, down, down, into the terrifying abyss of darkness beneath you. You open your mouth to scream for help, only for the salty water to fill your aching lungs. It's so cold it burns as you choke on it. There is no room for rational thought. One word slams around the cage like walls of your mind.

Drowning.

It explodes like a grotesque firework, splattering the back of your eyes with with ugly, harsh, blinding colours.

Drowning.

Don't get me started on what it feels like to drown. Don't get me started on depression.

One in five adults in the UK suffer from depression. That's one in five people who view the world who in black and white, whos days have become hopelessly indistiguishable, who continue to back away and destroy relationships with friends and family, who are ashamed of everything they have done and everything they have not, everything they are and eeverything they are not. That is one in five people drowning.

"Get over it", a critic will sneer, lazily flourishing a hand over one fifth of the population's pain.

Get over it? Did you actually just tell twenty percent of the UK to 'get over' chronic depression? Okay then how? Because trust me, we are desparate to know. How do we wake up in the morning with cracked, puffy eyes and not want to die? How do we recieve a compliment and actually accept it, rather than obsess over it all day and come toi the inevitable conclusion that it ws a lie? How do we hold a proper conversation with someone without overanalysing everthing we say? How do we live without the heavy weight of depression spread out on our shoulders, claiming us, wrapping itself around our necks, owning us, slowly, mercilessly restricting our breathing, becoming us, ruining us, killing us?

Depression is literally killing people but you won't look twice at us! Because it's not your problem, is it?

So don't get me started on assholes who are incapable of empathising, forget helping or caring.

What I'm trying to say is "I'm fine" doesn't always mean "I'm fine". Not if it's accompanied by cracked lips or bloodshot eyes or a hesitant voice or too skinny legs or sleeves pulled too far down. And maybe it's not depression. maybe it's just a bad day. It's irrelevant. Just please don't walk away, talk to them, walk with them or just say something nice because sometimes something small can make a difference.

And who knows? Maybe you saved someone from drowning.

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you so much for reading, this is my most personal work yet and I almost didn't write it for fear of vulnerability, but I'm glad I did. Comments and kudos are appreciated and if you need to talk about anything feel free to message me on tumblr: https://www.tumblr.com/blog/deadtoearth


End file.
